Some fights never make it past the negotiating table, and there’s one that still stands out more than a decade later. In the late 2000s, Brock Lesnar and Fedor Emelianenko were the two biggest heavyweights on the planet.
Lesnar had just become the UFC champion by knocking out Randy Couture at UFC 91, and Fedor was the undefeated pound-for-pound king coming out of Pride. Booking a fight between them was the ultimate dream match for MMA fans at the time.
Unfortunately, it never happened. The UFC CEO revisited the failed pursuit and his answer says more about the UFC’s business than the fight itself.
Dana White Reveals Why He’s Relieved Fedor Emelianenko Turned Down UFC’s Offer
White, who recently slammed FOX Sports, explained on “The Pivot Podcast” that he and then-UFC co-owner Lorenzo Fertitta personally flew out to close the deal with Emelianenko’s team. At the time, they were chasing a massive stadium show built entirely around a superfight with Brock Lesnar.
“We never got a deal done with Fedor,” White admitted. “But when me and Lorenzo got on the plane and left wherever the hell we were, we looked at each other and said, ‘Thank God they said no.’ Yeah, because we offered them so much money.”
The UFC boss explained that the intensity of the meeting room pushed the financial numbers way higher than they ever should have gone.
“You get in that room, and you’re just trying to get the deal done,” the 56-year-old recalled. “We didn’t fly all the way the f— out here for nothing. Let’s get this deal done, and we wanted to do it. We wanted to do him versus Brock Lesnar at the time.”
The meeting happened in August 2009, right after Fedor’s old promotion, Affliction, shut down. He was a free agent, so White tried to sign him right away. But the deal fell apart because Fedor’s management wanted to co-promote the event, and the UFC simply doesn’t share its branding with anyone.
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Meanwhile, Lesnar was the UFC heavyweight champion. He had just beaten Frank Mir at UFC 100, which sold a record 1.6 million pay-per-views. On paper, it was the biggest fight one could make back then, but both sides refused to talk about the business setup. Fedor ended up signing with Strikeforce a short time later.
Why Dana White Isn’t Losing Sleep Over It
Promoters usually hate admitting defeat. However, White’s business model has always relied on the brand being bigger than any individual fighter.
While missing out on the Russian legend seemed like a massive blow to the fans in 2009, the UFC’s explosive financial growth over the next decade proved that their rigid structure worked. They didn’t need to break their system for one man. Because of that massive success, White can look back at the failed meeting without any bitterness.
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White added, “I don’t regret it. And that’s really the only fight off the top of my head that I can think of that we didn’t make that we wanted to and that we tried to.”
Without that bout, Lesnar kept selling out arenas without it. The heavyweight division moved on with its own stars. And, Fedor never ended up stepping foot in the UFC cage.
The “what if” game surrounding this fight still tops every single list of the biggest missed matchups in MMA history, but White’s side of the story makes it clear that they gave it everything they had.
